I Can’t Sleep - The Origins of I Can’t Sleep

Episode Date: March 16, 2025

Ever wondered how a soothing voice, an old app, and a Parks and Rec joke turned into a full-time sleep podcast? Neither did I—but here we are. From a homemade recording booth to nearly 350 episodes, this is the story of how I Can’t Sleep became the bedtime staple you never knew you needed. Want More? Request a topic: https://www.icantsleeppodcast.com/request-a-topic Listen ad-free & support: https://icantsleep.supportingcast.fm/ Shop sleep-friendly products: https://www.icantsleeppodcast.com/sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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With over 200 episodes in our catalog, this podcast is for you if you're ready to crush self-doubt, conquer challenges, become stronger than ever with therapist-approved strategies that can change your life. Listen to Mentally Stronger with Therapist Amy Morin, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to a bonus episode of the I Can't Sleep Podcast, where I bore you to sleep with my soothing voice, one fact at a time. I'm your host, Benjamin Boster. And tonight's episode is going to be a little different. Instead of using the typical Wikipedia article readings, I thought I'd take a moment to share the fairly unexpected journey that led to the I Can't Sleep podcast.

It all started with an old app, a frustratingly soothing voice, and an unexpected source of inspiration from the delightful TV show, Parks and Recreation. So back in 2016, I remember discovering an app called Anchor.fm, which initially made it easy to record and share audio with other people. I felt like it was trying to be something along the world. lines of an audio version of Twitter. I love the idea of the app and what it was trying to accomplish. I remember playing around with the app quite a bit, but it never felt like it was really going somewhere. And then months later, I learned that they were pivoting their direction and focusing

more on helping new podcasters get started. They made it super easy. They had some music you could include. You just had to upload your content and publish it, and they would send it out to all the different podcasting platforms. That was intriguing to me because I love the idea of starting a podcast, but it'd struggled to find any sort of topic that made sense to me. And so just kind of ruminated in the back of my mind for a while. As time went on, I remember multiple occasions where people would share a very common thing, which was, Ben, your voice is so soothing. And I wasn't listening to what you said. I was just listening to your voice. So it was kind of this mixed feeling of, I think that's flattery, but also I think I should be offended because I thought I was

sharing something really important with you, and it wasn't taken that way. So one great example that kind of really stuck on my mind was I was riding in the car with my boss when I was working at a place years ago, and we were coming back from a conference. He was sitting in the back seat. I was sitting in the front seat, and another friend was driving, and I went on for maybe a good five minutes talking about things I'd learn from the conference, what we could improve upon as a team, and all sorts of wonderful things that I thought were just gold. And then when it was time for him to chime in, he gave that typical response of Ben, I'm so sorry, I stopped listening to you because your voice is so soothing and it put me to sleep. So he heard nothing, which is great. I was a little

bit frustrated, but also a little intrigued. So let's go back to anchor.fm. Anchor had started, right as I'd mentioned, as a mobile platform first, for recording and sharing short form audio. And then they grew into becoming a free podcast hosting service with distribution and monetization and analytical tools. And then in 2019, they were acquired by Spotify and integrated into Spotify for podcasters. So that whole thing is grown and evolved.

and that was very exciting for them. Around the same time, my wife mentioned that one of her close friends was struggling with something similar to me where people were being lowed to sleep by her voice. I thought, well, that's interesting. I remember I was rolling at my back that hurt it or something like that.

And we were watching Parks and Recreation. I believe it's season three episode 13 called The Fight, which features a really hilariously dull radio show called Thoughts for Your Thoughts, and it's hosted by a fictional character named Dairy Marbles, which is a fantastic name. But his slow, subdued delivery immediately struck a chord with me, and without realizing it, it became part of the foundation for I Can't Sleep. He would start with something like, welcome to thoughts, for your thoughts, where to, and he keeps going. And he interviews one of the characters from the show.

And at that moment, laying on my back, trying to fix a knot in my back or something like that, hearing that connection with my boss, my wife's friend, Anchor FM, it just kind of all was this sort of aha moment. I was like, I'm going to try and bore people to sleep. I think I even knew at that time I was like, the reason people are struggling is because they can't sleep. So I'll call it, I can't sleep. And it was done. So my first recording was super basic.

It was easy on anchoroff.fm to just pull up your phone, record, and publish. So I did just that. I recorded on my phone. I made this frame box out of scrapwood and just put some heavy blankets over the top. I recorded for what I thought was a really long time. And I think my first episode was like two and a half minutes long. It was super, super short. And it was about this random topic that I found called Jolais.

and I'm pretty sure that's how you pronounce it, which is a light sleeveless padded jacket. I've since redone that episode because I didn't like how poor the quality was, but I always wanted to keep that inaugural episode available on the podcast for listeners who ever made it that far. And some of you have, some of you listen to all of them,

so props to you for how many you've listened to you. And also, I really do hope you're getting better sleep and that you don't have to listen to so many. So Jolet, it's spelled G-I-L-E-T, is episode number one. And it's still there. You can go and listen to it. It got something like six listens. I was surprised that anybody listened to it.

In many ways, I thought, this possibly couldn't be a thing. Let's just try it a little bit. So I recorded that one. I started a couple other episodes and did those, and I remember hearing years ago that if you can just get past the first, I want to say seven episodes, if you can just publish your first seven episodes, then you've beat the majority of people who give up at that point when it comes to podcasting. So I thought that could be pretty easy. I spent a little time trying to find the right topic and figure out what people might find boring.

And eventually that led me to Wikipedia, but the first few episodes that I would, was trying to work on were other random like public domain articles. And that's, that's pretty much the origins of this podcast. It's been an interesting journey over the last six years, started in 2019, in March or April of 2019. So it's been a good six years up to this point. And something that started as just a small little experiment and was kind of funny with some friends. and I'm sure many of you have heard it and been like,

hmm, that's, that's kind of funny. And then you listen and say, maybe that kind of helps. And that's been really kind of fun. That's really been fun for me and fun for my family and, and all the friends that I share with and that you share with as well. So from that humble and simple beginning of a wooden frame, some blankets,

and a short recording about Jolais has turned into almost 300, and 50 episodes and a full-time career. So after being laid off in early 2024, I took the leap to make this podcast my main focus. And thanks to all the listeners like you, it's still going strong. So thank you. Thank you for listening.

Thanks for giving me a chance to help you to fall asleep each night. And I will continue to publish episodes regularly with the occasional bonus episode like this one. If you've enjoyed the podcast and want to support it, the best way is actually just to follow, subscribe, or share it with someone who could use a little help falling asleep. As always, thanks for listening and happy sleeping.